Screaming on the inside
by DarkTyger
Summary: What exactly is Garth thinking throughtout the case? Why did he never tell Amy?


**Summary:** What exactly is Garth thinking? What could drive a person to the point that their own blood is relished, thirsted for? What can we possibly do to reach someone in the grips of pain and depression, so far down they need to hurt themselves?

**Screaming on the inside.**

Freak.

Monster.

Crazy.

Disgusting.

Vile.

Stupid.

Your eyes hurl insults at my small, beaten body. You try to keep your reaction your secret, but I can see it. I see so much more than you do. You do not see the pain hidden within me, locked deep away for all the years of my awareness, so heavily masked and shrouded. I, however, see the pain within you. I see it in your tears and I hear it in your voice.

It has been a long time since I was able to cry. It has been a long, long time since I have been able to do anything to express the swirl of hurt and pain and anger and sadness and joy all locked in me at the same time, bursting from my skin.

You turn your head. I just keep staring. I know what you're thinking; you're wondering. You want to know why. You want to know why I break razors to get the blades, why I steal knives and Exacto blades from my mother, why I hold my body under the near-boiling water, why I hold my hands in the fire. You want to know how I could possibly find relief in pain.

You can see the scars. I don't hide them much anymore. It is too much of a hassle. People ask more questions when it's hot enough to fry an egg outside, and you're wearing a thick, long-sleeved shirt. I've realized that. I'm not stupid, like you all think I am. Knowledge-wise, I take more advanced classes than most of you ever will. I took tenth and eleventh grade classes in my freshman year. I pass my Spanish class with no trouble; the only reason I am not fluent is that I do not know all the words, but trust me, I am learning quickly. I understand humans, what we are, why we do the things we do, much better than you probably do. I can see undisclosed, hidden motives. I can look at things in all different lights. There is little my mind can't do if you give me the knowledge. I still don't know everything, though. I know that. It is a part of being wise, accepting that you do not know everything. I still have much to learn. I look forward to it.

So do you, obviously. From the stares and the carefully plotted avoidance, the whispers and the distance. You are afraid of me. You fear my scars. You believe if I will hurt myself, I will hurt you. That isn't true. I'd never harm another living soul. Only my own. Sometimes I wonder if I still have one at all, or if I've ripped it to shreds. Sometimes I think if I had a soul, I would cry. I would know how to live without the blade and the flame. I don't, though. I need the physical pain. It drowns my emotional pain, believe it or not.

I am weak. I can tell you believe I am nothing but a psychotic child who needs to be locked away. Well, I can agree on part of that. I have experienced psychosis. It was a reaction to medication.

I am not weak. If I were weak, I would be dead.

I can tell you don't believe me. I haven't spoken to you; not even to tell you my name. You had to pull it out of a file. Instead, I am writing this. I want you to see as much as you can inside my head. I want you to see what causes all the pain, the hurt. Even joy holds pain for me now. There is simply no escape. Not for me.

You've probably never been through what I've had to go through. I struggled through both anorexia and bulimia, and I triumphed. I fought against the depths of depression for months. I haven't triumphed over it; I never will. I am bipolar. I will always cycle between severe, crushing depression and highs.

Mania is hard to describe. It is like being on the best drug in the world. You feel like you can do anything. Nothing will stop you. You want to run ten miles in ten minutes? You can do it, you think. You don't have to do your homework; you're special, after all. You don't have to turn anything in, but you will still get an A in class. You don't have to be nice to anyone, but they will all treat you like a queen. You can do anything.

You feel happy. So happy. It is a relief from the depression you've been crawling through. You feel great. You feel so creative, and one of the best things is you won't have to sleep. Thirty years of the average human life is spent sleeping. In a manic-depressive with more mania than depression, that total comes to fifteen to twenty years, especially if their depression entails insomnia.

When you are manic, you are fine. You do not feel the need to harm yourself, or anyone else. It does have its downfalls, though. You have no judgement. That million-dollar smile you've been wanting? You are in debt, but you spend all of your non-existent money (along with what little you do have) on a pretty smile. This stranger wants you to get into his car? Ok. Why not? Now he's asking you to have sex? Oh, sure! As long as it feels good!

There is a part of your head that tells you it's wrong, but things are haywire. You can't think. Maybe you'll commit a crime. You'll get off, though. You can plead insanity, and you will win.

The worst part about all of this is yet to come. It will never go away. Ever. It is genetic. You can pass it to your children. You didn't know this, did you? Well, it's true. Bipolar disorder is for life.

You can't get rid of your past, either. Abuse, physical and verbal. Horrid memories of three sexual assaults. Even worse nightmares, rape, all rape. They will always be with you. Everything will stay. Even the eating disorders. They will never truly go away. Diet, and they will more than likely come back with a vengeance. Forget even one dose of your medication, and you will lose control of your mood swings. You lose all of your friends, and you strain your relationship with your boyfriend so much you're not sure if it'll survive.

And during all of this, you can't escape your head. You always believe it is your fault, and you are not good enough. You believe that you don't matter. Everyone else is more important.

Once, you slip off the edge. You swallow a gram and a half of painkillers, vicodin, Motrin, and another half-gram of one of your medications, Depakote. Depakote kills. It causes pancreatic failure, seizures, liver failure, toxicity.all sorts of horrible deaths. It isn't pleasant.

On top of all of this medication, you break a razorblade. You draw with a red pen over your veins on your arms, and you press the blade deep. You hit the vein, but it proves to be difficult. You can only knick it a little bit.

A little bit is enough, though. You wake up at four in the morning, having landed very luckily. When you fell unconscious, you slipped to the side, and you landed with your wrist underneath you. Your bodyweight rested on it. This is what stopped the bleeding.

You feel horrible, now that you've got a relatively clearer head. You realize how much leaving would hurt your boyfriend, the one person you truly do love. Your mother, your father. They would feel like failures. Again, they are much more important than you are, in your eyes. Your little brothers.they need you. They need your guidance. One is already starting to stray. If he slips into self-mutilation, you are the only one who can reach him. You have to stay. For him.

You feel like you deserve to be punished for even thinking about leaving. It has only added even more pain, since it didn't succeed. If it had been successful, you'd feel different, wouldn't you? It does not matter. You are still alive.

You spend the next week with bandages around your wrists. No one asks. They all assume. The scary thing is, they're right.  
Your head is full of pain. You cause yourself pain, but you can't help it. You don't know how. You've always thought you weren't so important as anyone else. You've always been taught to hold it in. When your father beat you when you were little, if you cried, it got worse. When your "friends" sexually assaulted you, all three times, they only won if you cried. But you couldn't help it, could you? All this pain is building up inside. Tears just don't come anymore. Raised voices only make it worse. You can't show it. You are scared to, and you don't know how.

What if someone thinks I'm a baby because this hurts so much? You ask yourself. You don't realize, in your illness, that people understand it isn't your fault. How you feel is not under your control. An emotional disorder has taken that from you, and they know it. They don't blame you. You can't see that.

Since you cannot take your anger and hurt out in tears, you turn to yelling at others, getting pushy and somewhat violent with them. You don't hurt them, but they get annoyed. They tell you if you do it again, your boyfriend is gone. You don't want to lose him. He saved your life. He is the one who helped you make it through everything you've been through. He is important to you. Far too important to lose.

So you stop. Instead of taking it out on them, you don't take it out at all. You don't know how. You used to be able to, but little ways like that don't even make a dent in the amount of anguish you feel now. Being bipolar has made it ten million times worse. Being sexually assaulted has made it even worse. Abuse only adds on. In school, you're ridiculed and taunted. It's all piling on, and it's too much. Your classes are getting harder and you can't sleep. With all these mood cycles, it's hard to even know what's going on. When you are manic, you usually don't remember what you do or learn. When you are depressed, you don't remember, either. You've been like this for two years. You don't remember between the ages of thirteen and fifteen very well at all. You hate it.

Sometimes, you wish you were dead. Sometimes you scream to the sky, just asking what's wrong. You just want to know what is wrong. Why you are like this when it is hard to see anyone else feeling like this. You begin to feel like an outcast and a freak. It gets worse. You get overloaded one day. Your father is screaming at you and you don't know why, your mother is in Chicago spending money you don't have, and you're in the middle of a depressive episode. It's all too much. You cut, for the first time. There are only ten slices between both arms. It is not bad at all, especially when compared to your later totals.

It fills you with a sense of relief. In some sick, twisted way, you are happy to see your blood flow. You know you're alive, because you are bleeding.

It'll surprise you, but that isn't the only reason it feels good. You sometimes feel like you're getting the punishment you deserve, yes, but there is a chemical reaction happening inside your brain, as well.You see, physical pain prompts the release of a happy chemical called endorphins. That's why when you get a cut, it only stings for a few seconds. Endorphins are natural opiates. Their structure is almost identical. You'd get the same relief from morphine.

All the emotional pain you have had to tolerate lately, however, will not release these chemicals. Because you're in a depressive episode, you are lacking them anyway. When you cut, let your blood coat the sink, your brain releases those endorphins.

It doesn't hurt, when you cut. Never has. Doesn't for a lot of cutters. We're in so much emotional pain we don't feel physical pain. When the endorphins come, however, we feel the relief. This is what we search for. This is why we do it.

You see now? There is a reason for my urges, for the razorblade and scissors and safety pins and knives that are often hidden in and confiscated from my bathroom. I have a special place for them. I have a special place for them in my bedroom, too. Take one stash. Go ahead. I have others. I can always get more.

You still don't see clearly, but I can show you no more. You have to see it for yourself, and I pray God never let anyone go through what I've been through. I've done my best. All I can say is we do it because we hurt. We are not proud. We are ashamed and horrified by what we do; we're just as horrified as you are. Eventually we accept it, though. As a part of us we want to hide. The scars will never truly fade away.

You want to help, you say. You take all my sharp objects, even the papers. Well, I hate to say it, but if I am set on cutting, I will find a way. I can scratch with my fingernails and rip with my teeth. I can break a plastic pen. I can do anything. I don't think straight when I am in that kind of unsafe mood. You wouldn't either.

If you want to help, listen to me. Let me show you how.

For now, however, I am done. I have exhausted myself telling you all of this. It is difficult. I don't like talking about it. If it helps anyone, though, it is worth it. And more than one person has told me I have helped them, I have given them a light to follow through a dark and dangerous journey. I am glad. I have done my duty. I can rest for a little while now.


End file.
